GakuseiDon

I suspect that the answers to one or more of your questions can be laid at the door of the sacking of Jerusalem in 70 CE. This destroyed the Jewish element, leaving the gentile part of the church to get along by themselves. If the Jerusalem group, the apostles and Jesus's relatives were pretty much wiped out by that event, that would explain the early gap in the history of Christianity.

Toto

in the 4th century, there were people claiming to be related to Jesus. See the references in this thread: Jesus' Jewish relatives

pierneef

As I understand this dilemma, the answers are to be found in the transition from the original Jesus Movement (which survived for about 40 years after Jeusus' death, and was fully Jewish albeit with some radical ideas by traditional standards of the time) into the Christian faith (which was Paul's creation, a blend of the original account with healthy dollops of paganism, greek gnosticism, and other influences). The link between the two is tenuous.

The gospels were written from sources. None of the writers had direct knowledge of Jesus, but inherited both oral tradition, and in all likelihhod at least one written source, Q, which has now vanished but has been reconstructed. The gospels were written just after or sometime after the struggle between Paul and James (Jesus' brother), which lead to the gentilisation of the Jesus movement and the crafting of the early Christian faith. The original Jesus movement probably survived the death of James, but was diasporised after the Roman destruction of the Temple. The two traditions continued side by side outside of Judea, but the Jesus movement became weak and fragmented, and little is known about its ultimate fate. (There is strong evidence is that its most lasting survival was in Ethiopia, which eventually led to the creation of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church (Tewahedo). However, the early Ethiopian followers of Jesus were converted formally to Christianity in the third century by missionaries out of Alexandria. Some of the Judaic Jesus influence however remains, and the church may in fact be the one that maintains the oldest and most authentic tradition of Jesus: http://www.eotc.faithweb.com/orth.html)

As the gospels were being written, effort were made to graft onto the Jewish tradition, the gnostic principles of a mystical relationship between Jesus and God, something utterly foreign to the Jewish faith and something Jesus himself would never have recognised or even understood. To confirm his newly found divinity, the story of the virgin birth was adapted from Greek myth and interpolated. So what we are left with is a mishmash of the original traditions and a large injection of new material that had nothing to do with Jesus' life, his beliefs or the times in which he lived.

The baptism story is probably authentic (minus the dove) because this was the traditional recognition of the messiah-king (remember that the Romans crucified Jesus as the "King of the Jews", which is probably authentic).
It had nothing whatsoever to do with divinity, but the Gospel writers present it as such. So the gospels present Jesus as yo-yoing between divinity and non-divinty in the rarher incoherent fashion that was described in detail earlier. I dont think there is any great reward in finding profound meaning in these inconsistencies. They are artifacts of the assembly and editing process and reflect the quarrels and power structures at the time of Christianity's early formation.

Amaleq13

How does this establish authenticity? It seems to me to provide an excellent motivation to fabricate such a scene.

pierneef

Sorry I dont understand. What is "it' ?

Magus55

Jesus didn't do what the Jews wanted Him to on His first time on Earth. The Jews wanted a war-like leader who would conquer their enemies. Jesus had different plans.

We have nothing written by Socrates either. But most people believe he existed. Whats your point?

Um we do. Most of the biblical authors knew Jesus in some form.

You mean like Mark, Matthew, John, Paul, James, Mary etc.?

Because He was considered a threat.

Probably because His hometown is a tiny little village that doesn't have much left to it.

What kind of evidence would you expect a poor carpenter to leave?

Paul received a vision and divine revelation from Jesus that changed His life.

Steven Carr

Is this what the Old Testament had prophesied?

Did Jews have no idea what was prophesied in the books that they themselves had written?

Amaleq13

"It" is everything after your "because" since that is presumably what makes you think the baptism story is "probably authentic".

In other words, why does the fact that this was the traditional recognition of the messiah-king make the baptism story "probably authentic"?

Amaleq13

The point seems pretty obvious to me. The alleged savior of the planet and Son of God chose to communicate his ultimately vital message by having numerous other people try to interpret it rather than write it down, himself.

This conclusion seems to be dependent on religious belief. The vast majority of scholars, including those who profess to be Christians, do not share this conclusion.

How was a Jesus a threat to anyone living in Nazareth?

That is a good question if that is all you think Jesus was.

Steven Carr

A poor carpenter who was a threat to the Roman empire?